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Vandals have added to the huge task facing staff at Brodick Castle addressing recent massive storm damage which wrecked the garden and grounds.
Desperately attempting to bring the jewel in Arran’s crown back into pristine order for the season, workers now face an extra task — clearing up the verges after a driver, or drivers, had a field day on Sunday night, tearing up the turf and leaving big ruts.
It was only two weeks ago that the castle and grounds opened to the public for the first time this year. Part of the grounds, the lower rhododendron walk, is still out of bounds to the public after ancient trees were uprooted in a huge storm several weeks ago.
First gardener Nick Bulloss said the damage caused by joyriders was the worst he had seen in the ten years working at the castle.
He said: ‘You can see where they have zigzagged down the drive and thrown sods of earth everywhere.
‘There have been previous cases of people driving over the grass but with the ground being so wet the damage is worse than ever.
‘This is quite deliberate. We will have to fill in the ruts and replace the turf.’
A lot of the grass verge around the car park and the full length of the beech hedge driveway have been churned up by car drivers deliberately skidding their vehicles during the night.
Disgusted supervisor Sue Tozer said: ‘The staff are only just getting over the serious groundworks after the recent storms. So many paths were blocked by fallen trees and now the staff have another massive clearing up job.’
The matter is now in the hands of the police. Sergeant Bob MacKay told the Banner they were appealing for information about the incident and said it might not necessarily be joyriders who caused the damage.
‘On a previous occasion the damage was found to have been done by a drunken driver weaving through the grounds with his girlfriend,’ he said.
